Pictures at an exhibition

Thanks to the Art Gallery Of NSW's 9pm close, I was able to peruse "Sidney Nolan: A New Retrospective" before dinner. While the set of Ned Kelly paintings from the mid-40s is spooky, the second series from the mid-50s is frightening. No, nightmarish! Two huge landscapes, "Riverbend I & II", also feature the bushranger. They take up half a room each. A cylindrical, darkened room with a slit for viewing out - just like Ned's helmet. There are enough quotes from Nolan scattered about to get a feel for his writing and, on that subject, the Ern Malley hoax is recounted. Besides an obsession with Kelly and the poet Rimbaud, the impression one gets is of continuous experimentation with new materials and subjects/styles studied while travelling Australia and the world. Sidney's genius was that he never aped, only adapted in service of an uncompromising vision.


Reading: "Zugzwang" (2007) by Ronan Bennett. (Mannered mystery set in the socially volatile St Petersburg of 1914, in which a string of murders is somehow linked to psychoanalysis and a grand chess tournament.)